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Unread 03/08/2011, 10:39 AM   #26
seafarm
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Rotifers absolutely will NOT culture in your reef system. They require far too much algae and get eaten almost immediately.


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Unread 03/08/2011, 04:20 PM   #27
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IME the time it takes for your eggs to hatch is temperature dependent. I've had them go 12 days before at 76F, and eggs from the same pair go 8 days at 80F. What's your temp?


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Unread 03/09/2011, 11:37 PM   #28
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it finally happened!

i collected about 20 of the fry which is right where i wanted. the nest was not huge, but i didnt want to try raising 100 clowns anyway and was hoping to get 20 to give them the best chance of developing.

now the real craziness stars i suppose!

i'm not feeding them tonight, -- do you all feed the night of hatching?

Joyce Wilkerson's book says to feed the next morning so that's my plan. come on rotifers i hope you are ready!


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Unread 03/10/2011, 08:41 AM   #29
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so this morning they are a little easier to count than in the dark with a flashlight zipping around.

i count 14 larva. i did find 4 dead ones unfortunately

there are also about a 12 that didnt hatch last night so i suppose i could try to collect those tonight.

i put in rotifers and a little rotiferdiet.

this is crazy! i hope i am doing this right i really want these guys to pull through. it seems like most of them are eating / have eaten some. i think they look ok. it seems like a bunch will congregate at the corner near the top and then a few will branch off and go eat in the middle of the tank and then come back.


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Unread 03/10/2011, 09:33 AM   #30
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anyone know what attracts them to corners / seams?

it seems like sometimes they "attack" the water line and bounce away. maybe they are hunting / learning how? would seem like there are more rotifers in the open water than in the corner at the water line. i did see one do the curled tail attack already, that was cool.


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Unread 03/10/2011, 10:44 AM   #31
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Awesome! Look forward to seeing the updates.


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Unread 03/10/2011, 02:30 PM   #32
Tahoe Reefer
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jonnybravo22 View Post
anyone know what attracts them to corners / seams?

it seems like sometimes they "attack" the water line and bounce away. maybe they are hunting / learning how? would seem like there are more rotifers in the open water than in the corner at the water line. i did see one do the curled tail attack already, that was cool.
Too much light may drive them to the sides or bottom of the tank.


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Unread 03/10/2011, 05:13 PM   #33
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Thanks. I assume it would be ok to add any larva that hatch tonight to the same larval tank as the 1 day old larva?


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Unread 03/10/2011, 05:32 PM   #34
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if my females don eat to much i can thing that in next days can spawing?


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Unread 03/10/2011, 09:26 PM   #35
jonnybravo22
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if my females don eat to much i can thing that in next days can spawing?
no i have never heard that to be the case.


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Unread 03/10/2011, 11:01 PM   #36
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just wanted to say again to everyone that is helping me out here i really appreciate it. i'm relying on your input to help get me through this experiment and hoping i come out on the other end with some healthy juvi clowns.

i was expecting to collect the remaining dozen or so fry that didnt hatch last night and were there this morning, however i got home late from work and the lights had gone out w/ the pump / filtration still going so i think i lost them. i turned it off when i got home and checked every 30 minutes and no fry so i said what the heck and shined the flashlight on the spot and saw they were all gone so i must have just missed them! oh well.

i have 14 larva in the larva tank. filled it pretty well with rotifers this morning before leaving and they still have rotifers left to munch. i guess i dont need to add any more until they've sufficiently thinned out the current stock. so i guess nothing to do now? i'll just test the water.



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Unread 03/11/2011, 07:20 PM   #37
duncaholic
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jonnybravo22 View Post
anyone know what attracts them to corners / seams?

it seems like sometimes they "attack" the water line and bounce away. maybe they are hunting / learning how? would seem like there are more rotifers in the open water than in the corner at the water line. i did see one do the curled tail attack already, that was cool.
Larval fish are phototropic. Thus we can collect them in a larvae catcher or other method by guiding them with light. In the early stages say day 1-15, Their movement is largely governed by light placement, strength and duration. If your larvae are crowding the corners, it is ikely that they are being side illuminated. This can cause dis-orientation and will affect the efficiency of their feeding. I have had some success breeding clowns, but have also had several miserable failures, and have as such done a enormous amount of reading on the subject. I'm certainly no expert, but the most recent book I read was written by a scientist who has breeding projects set up at several colleges/universities here in Florida, and what he says is that there are 3 principle consideration for the pelagic larval stage of marine fishes. 1. light - according to his book light should come only from an overhead source and should not be allowed to penetrate the sides of the larval rearing vessel. Also it should not be too bright, and should be on a regular photoperiod, such that the larvae are given a chance to rest at night. 2. water quality - The smaller the rearing vessel, the more difficult it is to maintain water quality. A nitrite spike in a five gallon bucket can cause total die off, while a twenty gallon container will buffer these swings more effectively. 3. food density and quality - Too many rots will degrade water quality. improperly enriched rots will ahve little nutritional value, and to few will cause your larvae to starve. For clowns he suggests 10-20 per ml.

I've lost my last four hatches. I've been trying to raise them in three gallon white buckets. It worked ok for the first hatch, but has failed ever since. I am currently setting up a larval rearing station with black 30g tubs. My lights will be flourescent shop lights mounted to the ceiling and have a 14 hour photoperiod. I hope all goes well as I have two batches set to hatch on Mon then Tues. I'll let you know how it works ... or doesn't work, but his book makes sense to me, and overhead diffuse overhead lighting will be my principle concern for the next batch.

A few questions you may have already ansewered, but I can't remember
1. What kind of tank are you raising them in glass/platic/size?
2. Do you have the sides blacked out?
3. Are you tinting the water green?
4. What kind of lights postioning/strength/photoperiod?
5. How are you measuring the density of the rots you're feeding?
6. Are you using enrichment feeds for the rots and if so are you adding this feed to your larval tank?

Not claiming super brain type knowledge, so don't take what I'm saying here as statments of fact, just stuff I read that seems to make sense.


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Unread 03/11/2011, 09:06 PM   #38
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thanks for the interest and for offering your insight duncaholic! do appreciate it.

here are some pics of the larval tank





have the sides covered pretty well by newspaper. the light is only overhead.
they are are swimming around the tank, a few of them just seem to ultimately like to rest in the corners after they swim around / eat


1. 5.5g glass
2. yes
3. slightly - not as green as rotifer culture, but a few drops of rotifer diet in there
4. just a standard room floor lamp about 3 feet above the tank facing down
5. havent measured the density, just put enough so that they dont have to travel more than a body length to eat a rotifer. they probably only have to go half a body length so density has been pretty high for days 1 and 2. i havent added any rotifers since day 1. they are thinning them out so i'm planning to just add them as needed.
6. only enrichment is rotifer diet. thought about adding selcon or something but i dont want to pollute and dont know if they would even make use of it if i put it tin the water. any insight there?


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Unread 03/12/2011, 08:04 PM   #39
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Never heard of anyone using selcon for fry, just the different algae strains. Some of them are really oily is why I was asking. last time I put rotigrow plus in the fry bucket and the next day I had an oil slick and a bunch of dead babies. As for the rest of your setup, it looks like you are much better prepared than I was for the first batch.

Good luck and post lots of pics please
-M


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Unread 03/13/2011, 07:52 AM   #40
jonnybravo22
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Quote:
Originally Posted by duncaholic View Post
Never heard of anyone using selcon for fry, just the different algae strains. Some of them are really oily is why I was asking. last time I put rotigrow plus in the fry bucket and the next day I had an oil slick and a bunch of dead babies. As for the rest of your setup, it looks like you are much better prepared than I was for the first batch.

Good luck and post lots of pics please
-M
thanks.

no oils slicks thus far.

it is the start of day 4. so far i have only "fed" once, the morning of day 1. the rotifer density has come down a bit but it was very high on day 1 and there are only about a dozen larva in the 5.5g tank so perhaps that's all that's needed. if it ever seems that the density is too low i'll add more but for now they seem to be eating fine and don't have to travel far. at what stage would people start adding Otohime? i've seen days 5/6 tossed around. does it coincide with meta phase or no?

anyone have a suggested timetable for progressing through the various sizes of otohime?


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Unread 03/13/2011, 04:02 PM   #41
doylef4i
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I would start using oto asap.The rots will only keep them alive for so long.


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Unread 03/13/2011, 05:19 PM   #42
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if i want to change the eggs into a other tank i dont have any problem?


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Unread 03/13/2011, 06:49 PM   #43
jonnybravo22
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Quote:
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I would start using oto asap.The rots will only keep them alive for so long.
So when do you start oto- day 4? Day 3? Day 1?


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Unread 03/13/2011, 07:34 PM   #44
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nice parents, good luck with the babies.


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Unread 03/14/2011, 07:15 AM   #45
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mine usually go on day 8 day 10 seems a bit lenghty

srry i was reading the first page hows the fry doing


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Unread 03/14/2011, 08:42 PM   #46
jonnybravo22
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started feeding Otohime A and B1 today. seems like they ate a bit of it.

pics just have rotifers though.














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Unread 03/15/2011, 09:45 AM   #47
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You will know when they start eating it for sure they will come to the top for it. They look like healthy fry you wanna keep there stomachs bulged out like that. I still feed rots sometimes through day 5 or 6. Make sure there ALL eating the otohime. Go to the larger size also as soon as you can. it floats better in the water (imo). Looking at the pics the water looks pretty clear are u tinting the larval tank with any kind of algae? You need to keep the rots healthy in order for the fry to be healthy. An empty rotifer has no nutritional value to the fry. Im sure you probably said it all ready but whats your temp and salinity at?



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Unread 03/28/2011, 01:09 AM   #48
jonnybravo22
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well - it's been 18 days. 10 of the little guys are still swimming around and seem to be doing well. for about 6 days i've been feeding otohime almost exclusively. in fact my rotifer "culture" has all but expired and there isnt much left there to harvest as i dont feed it anymore. hoping the otohime does it's thing.

i've been feeding size A, B1, and ocassionally testing some B2. Does anyone have experience they could share about what sizes they feed when to be most efficient and pollute water the least.

on that subject i did a mass water change this weekend where i replaced about 90% of the water with new water (day old) and siphoned out all the gunk that had accumulated from otohime and rotifer feedings and waste.

so now the water is like crystal clear it's a huge difference and sort of shocking how mucky it was by contrast. i hope the clean water is a good thing for them.

another change is that i finally took the newspaper covering off of the sides of the tank. i had left the tank sides completely covered for about 10-12 days. I think most people remove the cover after 2 or 3 days (not sure)? i wasnt sure and honestly didnt think about it until one day i realized they probably have more developed eyes by now and can tolerate light coming in sideways. their behavior hasnt changed much since removing covering so i take it they are fine.

so that's where i am. any thoughts on otohime / water change / covering larval tank?


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Unread 03/28/2011, 07:15 AM   #49
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I'm curious. My plan has always been to start out with rotifers and then switch to baby brine shrimp. You went to Otohime rather than brine. Is this common? Sound like it would make like a heck of a lot easier.


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Unread 03/30/2011, 07:16 AM   #50
jonnybravo22
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dont know how common. i learned it in this forum and tried it because it also sounded a lot easier to me.

any help on questions in my last post?


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